Kurdistan’s Weekly Brief June 28

Turkey

The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) MPs published ajoint statement accusing President Erdogan of attempting to establish his “one-man rule” in Turkey. In the statement, HDP deputies also said that the “HDP is the only obstacle before Mr Erdoğan to attain his goal; that is, to establish a dictatorship under the guise of a presidential system.”

Following the lifting of the immunities on deputies, the HDP’s Mush deputies Ahmet Yildirım and Burcu Celik were called in by the prosecutor’s office. Meanwhile Fikri Saglar a Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy said “The law regarding the lifting of immunities is in violation of the constitution, the law and decisions of the European Court of Human Rights.”

Syria

Manbij Liberation Operations : In retaliation for the Manbij liberation, ISIS abducted 900 Kurdish civilians in Al Bab and Manbij. Last week, the Manbij Military Council (MMC) liberated the silo and Sharia square west of the city. Meanwhile 266 displaced families from Al Bab and Manbij escaping ISIS arrived in Afrin. According to an official from Afrin Canton, 4,271 refugees have entered Afrin from Azaz. The Syria Democratic Assembly denounced ISIS for committing massacres against northern Aleppo and Manbij residents. They also called for the international community, UN and Security Council in particular, to provide more support to the SDF in its campaign to free Manbij. As of June 26, the MMC is proceeding toward Hazawine neighborhood, southwest of Manbij, and is less than a mile away from the central bazaar of the city.

After a siege that lasted more than nine months, the United Nations sent the first batch of aid to the people of the Sheikh Maksoud neighborhood in Aleppo. Since August 2015, human rights organizations and Sheikh Maksoud former and current residents have constantly called on the international community to provide aid to the beleaguered neighborhood.

ISIS posted a video of the execution of five journalists and activists in Dair Al Zor. The slain individuals included Samir Muhammad Aboud, chief of Interaction Network Firm for Development; Sami Jawdat Rabbah, an activist with the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights; Mahmoud Shaaban Haj Khider, head of al-Aan channel in Dair al-Zor; Muhammad Marwan Issa, a correspondent for Al Jazeera Net; and Mustafa Hase, a Human Rights Watch worker.

The YPG media office reported that several artillery shells “fired from the Turkish side of the border” hit their security building in Kor Eli. It was not immediately clear how many casualties fell in the attack.

Iraq

The Presidency of the Council of Ministers of the Kurdistan region urged Iran and Turkey to stop their attacks against Kurdistan Region border areas and stressed that the region must not be used for attacks against neighboring countries.

The joint council of the Patriot Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Goran (Change movement) visited Baghdad and held meetings with Iraqi Prime Minister Haydar Ebadi, the Al-Hadba leader Osama al-Nujafi, the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq leader Ammar al-Hakim, and Iraqi Parliament’s President Salim Al-Jabouri. Members of the council emphasized that the agreement ofMay 17 did not target any political entity or party, but rather aimed to not only improve the relations between Kurdistan and Baghdad but also to facilitate productive dialogue in order to foster effective problem solving among the various entities and parties.

The governor of Kirkuk, Dr. Najamaldin Karim, called on the Iraqi government to allow Iraq’s North Oil Company (NOC) to resume oil production in Kirkuk. During a joint press conference with Matthias Mitman, the US General Consul in Erbil, Dr. Karim urged Baghdad to grant the governorate more independence in decision making.

Iran

Iranian artillery shelled Kurdish villages in the subdistrict of Sidakan and in Haji Omran on Sunday June 26, two days after clashes broke out between Peshmerga fighters from the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) and Iranian soldiers. At least five civilianshave been wounded as a result of this most recent Iranian shelling.